Goals for the New Year

    

Ready for laminating!

     One of the things I love about teaching is that each year we get to reinvent ourselves.  This is not like making a New Year's Resolution where everybody knows the old you.  We literally get to reinvent ourselves with a group of people who know nothing about the way we were before.  It's a remarkably exciting feeling, to say the least. 
     This year my personal/professional goals are linked closely to my class make-up.  Last year 40% of my class had documented special needs (IEPs or 504s).  This year it's 0%.  This means I will not be eligible for any support in my classroom.  Because I teach in a district with high needs, this has never happened to me before.  What an opportunity!
     However, it's not going to be a year I can just coast.  No one in my class may have documented special needs, but there are still students who are struggling.  Also, meeting with the third grade teachers, I kept hearing, "Bright, but no motivation."  over and over.
     So these are my classroom goals that I'm going to be blogging about for the coming school year:
1.  Pump Up the Learning Center
When I hear about kids that lack motivation, I instantly think learning games.  I have tons of learning games and have used a learning center with various degrees of effectiveness for many years.  Now it's time to really invest in making it work.  A full blog post on this is coming soon!
2.  Making Daily Five Even More Motivational
I love Daily Five, but every year I have a few kids who are not motivated by it.  In fact, sometimes the very fact that I don't assign work makes them think I've given them a license not to carefully read grade level material for comprehension.  I'm still keeping Daily Five, but I'm going to have students write a short summary after each book they read (instead of a weekly journal) and earn Book Bucks.  Each quarter I will have an auction where they can use their  Book Bucks to purchase items.
3.  WBT 2.0
Have you heard about Whole Brain Teaching?  Well, Coach B has reinvented it with his newest version that emphasizes critical thinking and writing.  I am pumped!
4.  Tweaking Differentiated/Common Core Aligned Everyday Math
Last year I had the high average group for Math and also did not have any support.  So I created a differentiated weekly plan that aligned the outdated EDM version we have with the Common Core.  (see this blog post)  It worked out very well and my students made excellent progress.  I need to use that plan again, because I have about five students coming in with NWEA scores at the end of fifth grade range.  I'm going to have to use some fifth grade materials and I'm not sure how well that will go over with the fifth grade team, but I'm still gonna try.